SIPTU says sides closer on rail line dispute

Disruption of the State's rail services is set to continue today following the failure of the joint Labour Court-Labour Relations Commission initiative aimed at getting dissident train drivers back to work by this morning.

Meanwhile efforts were continuing early this morning to avert a potentially more disruptive action by line workers, mostly members of SIPTU, whose strike notice to Iarnrod Eireann expires at 8.30 a.m. today.

Mr Tony Tobin, a SIPTU negotiator who has been in talks almost continuously since Saturday morning, said earlier today that he was "hopeful that agreement could be reached following renewed movement on outstanding issues by Iarnrod Eireann". He added however that any agreement would be "close to the wire. We won't do this by 3 a.m. but the sides are coming together and we are going to stick with it."

Last Wednesday the company made an offer to SIPTU which dropped a previous insistence on compulsory night working, but it is understood that further difficulties emerged late yesterday on productivity and pay.

At its meeting in Tullamore, Co Offaly, yesterday on its dispute, the executive council of the Irish Locomotive Drivers Association (ILDA) decided not to recommend that its members return to work in line with the Labour Court-LRC initiative.

The executive council decided instead to call a meeting of its membership in a Dublin hotel this afternoon to vote on the initiative and a position paper which was approved by the executive yesterday. The paper reiterates the association's view that it cannot return to work what it insists is "an unsafe agreement".

It was circulated to all parties to the dispute over the weekend and approved by the executive council yesterday. It also says the agreement now being worked by members of SIPTU and the NBRU at Iarnrod Eireann is unsafe because it could involve train-drivers working a nine-hour day without a sufficient break.

ILDA suggests that 20-minute breaks be taken after three hours of driving. It also takes issue with the training of drivers and recruitment of "contingency" drivers who work elsewhere within Iarnrod Iarnrod Eireann but who may be called upon to drive trains as necessary.

In Tullamore yesterday ILDA's executive secretary, Mr Brendan Ogle, said he accepted that the ILDA position paper and the Labour Court-LRC initiative were "mutually exclusive". If the members voted to ratify the position paper, it would mean rejecting the initiative as it stood.

However, he insisted that he was not rejecting the intervention of the Labour Court-LRC which he welcomed and he maintained that they could become involved in a renewed initiative which did not include the drivers working the new deal.

Over the weekend Mr Ogle sought and received clarification of the Labour Court-LRC offer from Mr Kieran Mulvey, chairman of the LRC. However, he said the clarification did not convince him or the executive council that they could recommend a return to work.

Mr Ogle said he was disappointed that in eight weeks of the dispute, neither the company nor the Labour Court-LRC had appeared to appreciate the union's position on "serious safety considerations which have been confirmed by an independent expert, Mr P.G. Rayner".

Reacting to speculation in yesterday's newspapers that Iarnrod Eireann would now begin terminating the employment of ILDA members, Mr Ogle said four members had already resigned and, in the light of driver shortages, such action would be counterproductive.

A spokesman for the Labour Court-LRC said last night they would be making no comment on the ILDA reaction. However, The Irish Times understands there is considerable frustration in Lab our Court-LRC circles at ILDA's decision.

Mr Barry Kenny of Iarnrod Eireann said the initiative had offered the striking drivers "the dignity of an honourable solution". ILDA was attempting to renegotiate the deal already agreed between unions and the company. He also said ILDA's calls for clarification of the Labour Court-LRC initiative at the weekend were an attempt to negotiate changes to the initiative itself.